Insert Pet Name Here
by sunflowerb
Summary: Because according to Riku, you're supposed to give your girlfriend a pet name. Soracentric. sokai. post KH2. twoshot. Apparently, you're also not suppposed to forget 3-month anniverseries.
1. Part Un

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AN: So, honestly, I can't remember what it was that intially inspired this. But the idea came, it saw, it drove me crazy, it conquered, I wrote it. Such is usually my creative process.

**By the way, yesterday was my 17th birthday. Partay. Reviews are always appreciated.**

**post kh2, sokai, Sora-centric.**

**Disclaimer: I did not receive the rights to Kingdom Hearts for my birthday. (But I did get some really cool colored pencils)**

_**EDIT:** _After all of the wonderful and very helpful reviews I recieved, I revised and extended the ending, and have decided to turn this into a twoshot. The next chapter (dealing with the issue of Sora being in trouble) is in the works. Once again, thanks to everyone who reviewed, and to all of you who suggested that I fix the ending, and continue this ficlet. I hope the revised ending is better, it still gave me so much trouble.

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_Insert Pet Name Here_

"Hey Sora, I suppose congratulations are in order."

Sora expended the energy to raise one eyelid just enough to look at Riku, who had better have a very good reason for interrupting Sora's mid-afternoon nap. "Congratulations for what?"

Riku took a seat beside Sora on the sand. "Congrats because tomorrow you will have been willingly bound as a slave to another human being for three months."

Sora raised an eyebrow. "What?"

Riku smirked. "Tomorrow you'll have been dating Kairi three months. You know, three month anniversary?"

Sora sat up. "Really?"

Riku rolled his eyes. "I'm not even _in _this relationship and I know that. How don't you?"

Sora shrugged and laid back down. "Because it's three months. Why does three months matter?"

Riku was silent for so long that by the time he finally regained his speech, Sora had quite forgotten he was there. "You honestly don't know, do you?" Sora opened his eyes to look quizzically at Riku. His friend laughed in a disbelieving way. "Three month anniversary? You honestly didn't know that you celebrate the three month anniversary?" Riku laughed again. "Kairi's gonna kill you."

Sora sat up as the color drained from his face. He'd wondered why Kairi had seemed a little upset when his reply to her question of if he'd planned something for tomorrow night had been something along the lines of, "Oh, well, not really."

He frowned. "Why three months?"

Riku shrugged. "I don't know. Most couples don't last that long?"

Sora's frown grew. "How come _you _know about this stuff? You've never been out with the same girl more twice!"

Riku glared. "One, I've been out with the same girl more than twice. Two, _everybody_, with the exception of _you, _at least, knows about this stuff." Sora didn't answer. Riku shook his head at him. "I honestly don't know why Kairi puts up with you sometimes. Don't know why I put up with you sometimes either. Seriously, though, how're you going to go to Kairi tomorrow and say, 'Honey, forgive me, I'm an enormous moron who forgot our three-month anniversary.'"

Sora rolled his eyes. "Well, I'd start by leaving off the 'honey' part."

Riku sighed. "Well, insert whatever pet name you have for her there. What _do_ you call her, by the way? I want to get my impression right."

Sora shrugged. "Kairi."

Riku rolled his eyes. "Obviously. I mean by way of pet names. C'mon, I'm trying to impersonate you here. Gimme something to work with."

Sora shrugged, staring at the sand. He suddenly felt very uncomfortable, but without a clue as to why. "Well, just Kairi."

Riku went silent again. Finally, "First you tell me that you've never heard of a three-month anniversary, and now you're telling me that you don't have a pet name whatsoever for your girlfriend of three months?"

Sora shrugged sheepishly. Riku face became very well acquainted with his palm. "You're hopeless, you know that?" He looked up. "It's times like this where it amazes me most that she picked you."

Sora raised an eyebrow. "What does it matter, anyway?"

Riku blew his bangs out his eyes. "You're supposed to have _some _kind of a pet name for her or _something._ Honestly, as big of a sap as you are, I thought you'd have some sort of gooey, cheese romantic name for her."

"Like what, exactly?" Sora asked, a little harsher than he'd intended, still smarting from the sap comment.

Riku shrugged, rolling his eyes at the hopelessness of the situation. "I don't know! What does your dad call your mom? Haven't you ever heard them say stuff like that to each other?"

"Well, considering Dad's been dead for eight years…"

Riku paled in embarrassment. "…Right…"

Sora smirked. "Some friend you are." He quipped jokingly, watching Riku trying to regain his composure.

The older wielder was silent for a few moments before standing and announcing, "Well, you need to figure out a pet name for Kairi and some way of not ruining your relationship before tomorrow." He began to walk away, but Sora's reply stopped him momentarily.

"Once again," Sora reiterated his previous question, "How is it _you_ know about this stuff?"

Riku chuckled. "I actually make an effort to understand women." He took a step. "And I have sisters."

Sora frowned, before his frown was quickly replaced by a mischievous smile. "Do they like to play with your hair?"

Riku merely pretended he hadn't heard, but Sora derived great satisfaction from knowing he had.

The brunette flopped back on the sand and blew his bangs out of his eyes. A pet name for Kairi, huh?

Easier said than done. What sort of things did other guys called their significant others? Babe, princess, sweetie? He and Riku had been jokingly calling Kairi all of those things for years. Honey, sugar, baby? All those things his mother called him? No, no. They just didn't fit. They weren't Kairi.

Kairi was…Kairi. A regular old pet name just didn't fit. There was 'Kai', he supposed; but everyone called her Kai. It wasn't special if that was what everyone called her.

Kairi was special; and if he was supposed to give her a pet name, then it had to be something special. It had to be something that fit her. Sora took a deep breath and let it out slowly, thinking. What was Kairi, then? Kairi was…unpredictable. There was no telling what was going through her head at any given time. She wasn't wild, exactly, not in the way most people thought of wild, at least. She was wild in a good way. She was strong, resolute. But then she was sweet, and pure, and kind, and the very quintessence of light incarnated. Every day he was reminded of how unbelievably lucky he was just to be holding her hand. Somehow "Honey" just didn't seem to sum that up.

The kind of name that fit was more like 'Darling', or 'Love', or 'Pet', or something else that wasn't used as often and sounded British. She deserved some sort of pet name that was as unique and different as she was. Kairi was Kairi; simple as that.

And maybe, Sora decided, that was enough. So maybe he didn't call Kairi 'baby' or 'sweetie'; those weren't her name and she'd yet to imply that she cared anyway. So he wasn't the perfect boyfriend; not the perfect prince for the princess. He never claimed he was good at this and he sure as heck never claimed he knew what he was doing. He loved her, and isn't that what really mattered? Maybe he didn't show it by calling her by some sappy pet name, but she knew and that was all he really cared about.

What did it matter really, that he didn't have a conventional pet name for her? He wasn't a conventional boyfriend. They'd never really had a conventional relationship, and when it got right down to it, it had been a good long time since _anything _in their lives had been conventional.

After all, it wasn't about pet names. It was about love.

However, he doubted that "It's not about anniversaries, it's about love," would get him out of trouble. He had to think of some way to celebrate before tomorrow. Kairi may not care about pet names, but she would care about _this_. Exactly _how _he was going to do it, Sora hadn't the slightest idea. Maybe he could ask his mother…she was a girl. She would know what a girl would expect from a three-month anniversary. And she would know much better than Riku would.

But then, Sora supposed, it wasn't really so much about what a girl would expect so much as it was about what Kairi would expect.

That's what it came down to, he thought. It wasn't about what he was supposed to do with a girl, it was what he was supposed to do with Kairi.

.**.**.to be continued.**.**.

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AN: I just hope this didn't suck. The idea wouldn't leave me alone, and I'm willing to write just about anything if it'll bother me enough.

Reviews make nice birthday presents. (Hey, this is the only time of the year I can abuse the birthday card.) Even if you say you hate it. I like hearing people's input.


	2. Part Deux

**A/N: I am so sick of this story by now. Part of me wishes I'd just left it alone. Oh well. Here's part two. I never could get it to flow quite right, but I've decided I dont' care. I don't plan on continueing this, or even revising it. It's driven me crazy, and I'm sick of thinking about it.**

**Still, I'm very thankful for all the suggestions I got, and all the help. Without the aid of my dear reviewers I'd never have gotten this far.**

Disclaimer: What do you think?

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_Insert Pet Name Here_

_Part two_

"Sora, how could you forget something like that?!" Sora sighed. Great, everyone, including his _mother_, had remembered (and understood the importance of) his three-month anniversary with Kairi.

"Oh, Mom, not you too!" Sora groaned, as his mother started rushing around the living room, pulling out old photo albums, apparently searching for one in particular. She was telling him something, but Sora was busy ignoring her as she was busy talking to him.

"Found it!" She emerged from a cabinet with a musty old photo album.

"Found what?" Sora asked, disinterested, rubbing his temples.

"This album's got pictures we took back when your father and I were still dating…"

"Oh, geez…" Sora rolled his eyes and tried to flee before he got roped into hearing his mother's stories of her younger years.

"No, no, no, Sora…" She grabbed his arm and pulled him back onto the couch. "Look, here, it'll give you ideas." Sora groaned again, and sensing that defeat was inevitable, he resigned himself to a dosage of his mother's memoirs. "You know your father was _such _a romantic…"

"Oh, _geez_…" Sora attempted to leave once again, but his mother, without even looking up, grabbed his arm and dragged him back onto the sofa again. "_Mom…_"

"And since you're _so _much like him," She continued, looking through the album with eyes starry with days long past. "I think you could be _just _as romantic." Sora groaned and blew his bangs out of his eyes as his mother set the album on the coffee table in front of them. She pointed to a picture on the left page. It was of his parents, probably in there early twenties, sitting on what looked like the curved paopu tree. There were paper lanterns strung along the branches of the palm trees, and a candlelit dinner table in the background. "That was the night your father proposed…"

Sora rolled his eyes again, but then he started to think about the picture. A lantern lit dinner at the small outcrop on the play island…it did seem romantic. He could do that…

Sora grabbed the album and took off, leaving his mother sitting on the couch, wearing a knowing smile. "Thanks Mom!"

--&--

Sora hummed a little tune to himself as he hung round paper lanterns from the palm trees surrounding the little islet. He'd spent the better part of the day re-creating the scene from the picture his mother had shown him. Surveying his work, he smiled, and whipped out his cell phone to call Kairi.

He'd yet to actually tell her of his plans for that evening, you see.

"Hello?"

"Kairi? Hey, look, I've got a great idea for tonight-"

"Sora, look, about that-"

"I'm not going to tell you what it is-"

"Sora, really, hang on-"

"-because I want it to be a surprise-"

"Sora, I-"

"-Just come to the island tonight, around eight o'clock-"

"Sora-"

"-and you'll see-"

"SORA!" Sora trailed off and allowed his girlfriend a chance to speak. "Sora, I'm sick."

Sora's heart plummeted into his stomach. "What?"

"I'm sick. I think it's a cold. But whatever it is…I think I'm going to have to cancel for tonight…sorry."

Sora sighed. "Oh, um, o-okay."

"Well, I'll see you soon. Bye."

"Yeah…see ya." Beep.

Sora put away his phone and looked with sad eyes at the now-useless set up he had created for their date. But just as he started to clean up, he was struck with an idea.

--&--

Kairi rolled over and buried herself deeper into her blankets. Her fever must be rising, she reasoned, she was getting chills. "Hey, Kairi." Her pale face emerged from the comforter, and she gave him a weak smile.

"Hey Sora."

"I brought you some soup." Sora held up the bowl of steamy broth his mother had made for Kairi. He'd wanted to make Kairi some soup himself, but his attempts at cooking had always been utterly pitiful.

Sora pulled up a chair to Kairi's bedside and, despite Kairi's adamant protests, began spooning chicken noodle soup down her sore throat.

"Sora, you don't have to-" She began, but Sora simply shoved another spoonful of soup into her mouth.

"Shh, just shut up and eat your soup, darling." And there it was. He noticed she…_reacted_, to the pet name. He couldn't tell if it was a good reaction, or a bad reaction, but it was a reaction nonetheless. She noticed that he'd called her something out of the ordinary. But she didn't say anything, which Sora took to be a good sign.

"I can feed myself, you know." She complained, pushing the spoon away.

"I know, I know," Sora told her, smiling sympathetically. "But I didn't get to take you on a romantic date, so the least you could do is let me take care of you, love." And there it was again; she reacted to the title of 'love' the same as she did to 'darling'. But once again, Sora couldn't tell if it was a good reaction or a bad reaction, and once again, Kairi didn't say anything, so neither did he.

"Sure," she said slowly.

"So, once you get better, whaddya say we try again on this great date I had planned, eh pet?" Sora grinned at her.

Kairi pursed her lips, but didn't reply for a moment. Finally, "Sora, what the heck?"

Sora opted to play dumb. "What are you talking about?"

" 'Darling'?" Kairi quoted, a questioning tone to her inquiry.

Playing dumb wasn't going to work. Sora sighed. "Riku said guys are 'spose to have pet names for their girlfriends."

To his surprise, Kairi laughed. "Since when does Riku know anything about having a girlfriend?" Sora felt his spirits lifted at her words. His own reminders to himself were nowhere near as effective as hers. Kairi wasn't just any girl; and he couldn't expect his relationship with her to be like one with just any girl. "Stop trying too hard, _darling._"

And laced within her teasing was the lesson he was finding it hardest to learn. It was when he started trying so hard to please her that he found himself tripping over his own two feet. It was when he just went with the flow that things worked out best.

So perhaps their three-month anniversary hadn't culminated in a romantic paper-lantern-lit dinner on the island, but that would have been conventional. And since when had anything for them been conventional?

So maybe he didn't have a pet name for his girlfriend, and maybe he spent their three-month anniversary at a sick bed spooning chicken broth into his sick girlfriend's mouth. It was perfectly characteristic of their crazy lives.

And Sora wouldn't have it any other way.

--&--fini--&--

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A/N: Blegh. I'm still sick. But I've finally finished this! YAY!


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